Year Review & December 2021: Electric Car Count
Welcome to a bumper edition of Electric Car Count, containing a review of 2021 as well as our usual review of the past month’s new car registrations.
2021 in review
2021 saw very welcome growth in the number of electric cars sold in the UK. After the disruption wrought by the pandemic in recent years, 2021 saw a return to something nearing normal conditions for car showrooms. Electric cars were the fastest growing segment of the market. Petrol and diesel showed continued decline, and hybrid sales stagnated. However, while rapidly growing EV registrations are to be celebrated, at the end of 2021, electric cars represent just 1% of the UK’s 32 million passenger cars - a lot done, a lot still to do!
Commenting on 2021’s Electric Car Count data, Ben Nelmes, Head of Policy and Research at New AutoMotive, said:
“Last year saw continued enormous growth in the number of EVs registered as UK motorists increasingly fell in love with electric cars. People across the country discovered the benefits of switching to electric cars, from the cheaper running costs to better environmental performance.
“We need to put rocket boosters under this transition. Ministers should set out ambitious targets for electric car sales for the UK’s planned Zero Emissions Vehicle Mandate. The government must use every tool in the box to get electric cars into the hands of high mileage drivers to maximise emissions reductions.
“Local authorities also have an important role. The extra 180,000 electric cars on the road in 2021 is small compared to the 32 million polluting cars on the road. To reduce emissions, local authorities should accelerate the implementation of clean air zones, promote modal shift and active travel alongside electric cars where appropriate.”
UK market overview: 2021
Since 2017, the UK market has been in a state of flux, before which petrol and diesel cars shared about 50% of the market. First diesel, and now petrol, have since gone into decline. Our chart below shows the market share of the different passenger car fuel types on a 3 month rolling average. 2021 saw petrol and diesel continue to lose market share, and a significant growth in the market share of electric cars particularly in the second half of the year. Hybrid registrations have started to slow, and may even be losing market share.
Regional breakdown
2021 saw increased action by local authorities to promote clean transport and active travel. In March, Bath’s Clean Air Zone (CAZ) came into force followed by Birmingham’s in June. October saw London’s Ultra-Low Emissions Zone expand to cover most of inner London and in November Portsmouth’s CAZ went live. Many of these places are among our top ten list of DVLA Areas for EV registrations in 2021.
Car manufacturers: leaders and laggards of 2021
2021 saw a growing number of electric car models on offer as more manufacturers launched new electric models in a bid to maintain their share of the future (fully electric) car market. 2021 saw further decline of Tesla’s share of the market for new EVs from 23% in 2020 to 19% in 2021. Manufacturers who currently produce ICE vehicles must transition away from producing internal combustion engine vehicles to batteries and new chassis designs. The Electric Car Count usually covers the brands that are quickest to electrify - in our 2021 review of the year we’re also looking at the parent company. We’ve ranked the car companies with a major presence in the UK market (excluding those with 100% electric car sales, like Tesla).
The fastest three
The companies who saw the most progress towards all-electric sales in 2021 were Geely, Mazda and Daimler, who sell Volvos, Polestars, Mazda, Mercedes-Benz and Smart cars. They saw significant increases in the percentage of their car sales that were fully electric.
The slowest three
The companies transitioning to all-electric sales the slowest in 2021 were Ford, Jaguar Land Rover and Honda. Despite half all new Jaguars being fully electric, JLR actually went backwards and sold fewer electric cars as a percentage of all its car sales in 2021 than in 2020.
The biggest three
The biggest car companies by volume are Volkswagen Group, Stellantis, and Hyundai. They have all seen significant growth in EV sales as a percentage of their new car sales. Hyundai, which also owns the Kia marque, are the clear leaders among the biggest companies by sales volume, with over 15% of its sales now fully electric in 2021.
December 2021
December was yet another record breaking month for electric car sales. Electric cars were the second most popular type of car sold, and fewer than half of all cars sold were petrol - the first time that petrol cars’ share of the market has fallen below 50% of the market since 2016. Pure electric cars also outsold hybrids for the first time on record.
Commenting on December’s registrations, Ben Nelmes, Head of Policy and Research at New AutoMotive, said:
“December saw a seismic shift in the UK’s new car market, with fully electric cars displacing hybrids and seizing second place. This month's report shows a fantastic end to 2021, which saw great progress in the transition to electric cars in the UK.
“While there is a lot to celebrate, there is a lot more still to do. There were 180,000 new electric cars bought in 2021, but far more petrol cars drove off forecourts, joining a fleet of 32 million polluting cars, and will emit climate changing carbon for the next 14 years.
“This year, Ministers will set out the details of their Zero Emissions Vehicle Mandate - the UK needs ambitious targets that boost uptake and accelerates this transition to net zero road transport.”
The full data release is available here. You can view the data on our interactive dashboard, here.
UK market overview
Petrol jumped into the number 2 spot in the list of most popular fuel types. Hybrid sales continue to stagnate, while diesels bump along the bottom and petrol continues its slow decline.
Regional highlights
Based on a three-month rolling average, the following areas are EV hotspots this month, with EVs taking the following shares of new car sales:
Oxfordshire - 40%
Newcastle - 31%
Kent - 30%
Bristol - 29%
London - 27%
Cambridgeshire & Peterborough - 27 %
In South West London, the number of new EVs in December outnumbered the number of new petrol cars.
Refer to tables 4 & 5 for full regional statistics.
The race for EV market share
December was dominated by Tesla, who had their biggest ever month for UK sales. Tesla captured 36% of all new electric car sales, but a number of other players continued to significantly increase their presence in the EV market.
For the full data, and year-on-year comparisons, refer to table 1 in the full release.
The brands who are quickest to electrify
Niche brands dominate the list of the top ten brands that are quickest to electrify, but MG, Jaguar and Lexus now have significant shares of their new cars being fully electric.
For the full data, refer to table 2 in the full release.
Notes
About Electric Car Count
Electric Car Count is a monthly data series from New AutoMotive, a not-for-profit independent transport research organisation with a mission to accelerate and support the UK’s transition to electric vehicles. You can find out more about New AutoMotive by visiting www.newautomotive.org/mission
Electric Car Count provides an overview of the newly licensed passenger cars. It is released monthly, in the first few days of each month, providing data on the previous month’s newly licensed cars. In the UK, vehicles must be licensed (also known as registered) to be legally driven on UK roads.
We provide an overview of the state of the market, showing the number of cars registered by each manufacturer, broken down by fuel type. This provides a new way to track the transition to EVs in the UK.
Visit our interactive data dashboard here: www.newautomotive.org/ecc
For more background information on the statistics we provide, you can read our blog about the race for EV market share: www.newautomotive.org/blog/the-race-for-ev-market-share-is-under-way
Data sources & methodology
The data is shows the number of type M1 vehicles (i.e. passenger cars) in the DVLA’s vehicle licensing database as it stands on, or shortly after, the 1st day of the month. The DVLA’s vehicle licensing database is the legal record of all vehicles licensed for use in the UK. We obtain the data from the DVLA’s vehicle enquiry service API, and the DVSA’s MOT history API.
The data covers all cars with a standard form UK vehicle registration mark (VRM, i.e. the vehicle’s number plate), but does not capture any vehicles with personalised VRMs.
Terminology
We use the following terms to refer to vehicle fuel types:
Pure electric: battery electric, or other purely electric-powered vehicles (such as hydrogen). These are vehicles where the drivetrain of the vehicle is only electric, with no facility to drive using a fossil fuelled engine.
Hybrid: vehicles that have the ability to drive under electric power or under fossil fuel power. These include vehicles classified by the DVLA as “hybrid electric”, “electric diesel”, for example.
Q&A
Why are the numbers different from other organisations, such as the SMMT?
Our numbers are typically slightly different from those published by the SMMT. We cannot speculate as to why this is because the SMMT do not publish the methodology for obtaining their vehicle data.
Our data is based on the DVLA’s legal record of vehicles licensed as it stands on the first of the month.
Our methodology does not capture newly registered vehicles with a personalised number plate. These take longer to appear in our database, and are not included in the monthly release. We do not believe that these are a statistically significant part of the market.
Will you make this data open and accessible to more organisations?
Yes, we are happy to supply the data to anyone where doing so will not conflict with our mission. We encourage people to reach out to us on data@newautomotive.org.
